Last night my almost eight year old had his world crash down around him. He discovered the truth about Santa. There is no cute discovery story here. I didn’t get to write a nice letter telling him about the magic of the holidays. I didn’t get to ease him into this. It was abrupt and frankly ugly.

He looked over my shoulder while I was tackling work stuff and happened to see a document I designed. Working mom life crashed with regular mom life. It was messy with shattered glass and tears and sadness.

He caught a glimpse of a letter to the boys from the elves. And I like to design things, so it wasn’t just in a word doc. No it had all the flair of me, perfectly laid out in a design program. And he saw it. There was no going back.

I tried. I tried to skirt the issue. I tried to ask what he believes in his heart. I tried to say I didn’t buy the elves this year. He caught the this year part. He wouldn’t believe that he had just imagined this document. He knew what he saw. He demanded the truth. Finally, I broke down, unable to lie any more, unable to clean up this mess of mine. I gave him the truth.

Then he collapsed into a hysterical mess. “There is no Santa and that means there is no Christmas.” And I felt like I’d failed as a parent. I hugged and rocked and reassured. I told him the story of how I found out. I told him this means we have a secret that’s just ours. His brother doesn’t know.

I reassured him he still gets the gifts. “Christmas isn’t about gifts!” He shouted back.

I asked if he understood that this means I’ve done the magic and that means that I love him so much that I’ve tirelessly created all of these things all these years.

Almost eight year olds can’t reason like that in the midst of world crushing news. Can adults even? Doubtful.

I left it for a couple hours. We did homework together. We chatted, about other non-Santa related things. And then it was bedtime. That gloriously difficult time of the night. The steep hill at the end of the marathon. Each boy headed to their respective room. The little one full of tantrums and pleas for never going to sleep and more water and kisses and mama mama mama mamas. The big one, patient and waiting, getting himself changed and brushed and situated.

The big one walked out of his room, requesting his song and hug. I was standing in front of the elves. The almost eight year old said, “I wish I could touch the elves.” The little one opened his door. The big one scurried back to his room. “Mama! Mama! MAMA!” The little one shouted. I urged him to get back in his room. He begrudgingly closed his door.

His face lit up, his eyes widened as far as they could. His eyebrow raise made me jealous. “Really?”

“Go ahead. You know. With age comes privileges like this. It’s our secret and now you know and now you can touch them. Plus. This is our game now. I’m going to make it hard to find them. And only we will know.”

He picked them up and turned them around, taking their hats off, playing with their outfits. His fingers gently moving across the felt fabric. His smiled spread across his perfectly smooth face, his dimples deep-set in his cheeks, his eyes aglow. He was beaming and happy and the magic of Christmas hovered all around his string bean body.

“Did you want to choose their outfits for tomorrow?” I asked.

“What? Outfits? You have outfits?” He was shocked.

“She’s been holding out on you. She has a whole stash,” my husband chimed in.

Then we sat on his bed, after closing the door, in secret hushed tones I showed him where they were stored and we went through each piece of clothing, discussing the outfits. He made his choice. A Christmas tree costume for his and a Candy Cane outfit for his brother’s. He requested I order a tiny soccer ball for another outfit. He went to bed happy and excited. His tears of heartbreak dried and gone, replaced by the excitement of our new tradition. Our secret.

And maybe, hopefully, the thought that growing up isn’t so bad after all. It’s just different.

I am sitting here on my couch, sipping my coffee, listening to Christmas tunes, and reflecting on the past year. Mostly thinking about the difference between last Christmas and this current one. They have both been very happy and wonderful. I thought last year was the biggest Christmas of my life, Jack’s 1st Christmas! But I have to confess that this year has blown last year out of the water. I know there is a lot of focus and importance placed on that 1st Christmas, but I think this year is even better.

Jack won’t remember a thing from last year. Not one second. He couldn’t open gifts. He couldn’t enjoy much Christmas food. I was still nursing. He has just sort of started sleeping through the night, but it wasn’t like it is now. He was not walking or talking very much. A couple times he got frustrated with the whole gift opening process. I was hosting both days. I was exhausted, swamped, and Jack really did not know what was going on. We had a wonderful time. I was excited for Christmas morning. I took videos and photos galore. I threw all of my energies into it, like I did this year. BUT this year there is a twinkle in his eye. He talks about Santa. He can actually open all of his gifts. He knows what a gift is! He knows what snowmen, elves, snowflakes, trees, lights, and candy canes are. He begged us to go play in the snow the other day.

He insists that Santa, Ho Ho, will knocky on the door, when brings Jack’s toys. Yes he says, door, knocky, Ho-ho! It makes me laugh. I have been telling him that I think Santa will be sneakier than that.

I am so excited for Christmas morning that this past week has been dragging. I am done wrapping every single gift. I really have nothing left to do for Christmas. I have to go get some food this morning, but that is it! I cannot wait for tomorrow morning. As a matter of fact I gave him one of his gifts last night. I really wanted to open it and play with it.

It is so different than last year. I see this joy in his face when he talks about all of the Christmas things. He gets excited. He wants to play with all of the ornaments on the Christmas tree. You know what, I let him. We have had a couple casualties, but mostly he only gets the shatter proof ones. I know that I am probably awful for thinking his 2nd Christmas is way cooler than his 1st, but hands down, it is. Seeing the Christmas joy in your child’s face and eyes makes such a huge difference. I imagine Christmas from here on out will be similar to this. Maybe each year topping the last. As he comprehends the world more and more.

Christmas in my house was always magical. Always. My mom went out of her way to decorate our home and our tree. I remember coming down in the morning to huge piles of gifts. Were they always super huge? Probably not, but to a child, any pile looks big. My mom always did the best with what we had for Christmas. I do not remember a non magical Christmas. Filled with lights, a tree, Christmas cheer, family parties, Christmas songs, and warm love. I have distinct memories of just the Christmas lights on in the evening as we all hung out, watching Tv or whatever. To this day I still love having only the glow of Christmas lights filling a room. I told my mom this year my passion for making Christmas so magical for Jack comes from what she always did for us. She told me it made her cry happy tears. I know now why she did it all. I thought I knew last year, but I didn’t truly understand until I saw his little face light up when I told him noises from the chimney/fireplace were Santa doing a practice run. He said HO HO! And the next time it made noise, he shouted HO HO again, all on his own. If you ask him who is coming in a couple days, well one day now, he will say “Ho Ho!” Can I stress enough how much he is into Santa? I know i keep mentioning it, but it is so cute I can’t even handle it.

Here is a look at last year and this year. Well, this year not exactly, since I cannot post Christmas photos I have not taken, but it is close enough, since Christmas starts the day after Thanksgiving in this house. This year it started the day before because we were going out of town.

Last year Christmas Eve

My love and me on Christmas Eve last year

I took this the other day. This is one of his wonderment faces!

Loves the tree, lights, and ornaments

This was from celebrating Christmas with my inlaws last weekend. They went to SC this year to visit my sister inlaw. So we celebrated early

Merry Bearsmas. This was also our Christmas card photo!

I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas Eve and Day! I hope both days are filled with love, family, joy, happiness, excitement, magic, and just peace. I hope you get an opportunity to see the wonderment in a child’s face that I know I will be completely absorbed in over these next two days. Merry Christmas!!!! Also, feel free to share your thoughts on Christmas getting more awesome as your child grows. I hope I am not the only mom who thinks the 2nd is way cooler than the 1st! 😉